#and the tree is standing still :: xerneas headcanons | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

sage-nebula · 8 years ago

Note

1, 12, 31, and 36 for Sycamore, 8, 22, 33, and 45 for Alain, aaaand 6, 17, 24, and 49 for BotW Link!

Sycamore—

1.) What does their bedroom look like?

Okay, so, his bedroom is the master bedroom in the house (/lab—I mean, it’s both). This means that it’s both the biggest bedroom, and he has his own private bathroom.

For the actual, specific bedroom, the flooring is faux-wood laminate, quite like many of the other hallways and rooms in the house area (it would be actual hardwood, but actual hardwood is hard to upkeep, and with so many pokémon running around it would be unwise). He has a large area rug on the floor at the foot of his bed that has a pretty blue and gold design. His walls are a soft, bluish-purple (like this color)—more purple in the daytime, with the sunlight streaming in through the windows, but more bluish at night with the lights off. Nice and calming either way.

His bedroom actually two double doors that open into it (both the same type of wood that Alan’s bedroom door is—same color and everything), though the one on the right is pretty much always closed, with the one on the left being the only one ever opened. If you’re standing in the doorway, then along the back wall (straight ahead) are his windows. Sycamore’s bedroom actually has three large, rectangular windows, all side-by-side. Since his room is right next to Alan’s, his windows look out over the backyard, just as Alan’s does. Sometimes Sycamore leaves the windows open at night, so he can listen to the sounds of nocturnal pokémon. It’s nice.

Still from the perspective of the doorway, his (king-sized, because he likes big, comfy beds) bed is against the right wall. Specifically, the headboard of his bed is pushed up against the right wall, and the bed itself is positioned in the center of it, a nightstand on either side. Like Alan’s, Sycamore’s bed is a captain’s bed; there are shelves and drawers built into the headboard, as well as drawers on either side of the bed for extra storage. Many of the drawers are unused, actually, but Sycamore likes having lots of storage just in case. The bed frame is warm cherry wood. There are tons of pillows up along the headboard—some decorative, but most actually used, believe it or not—and the bedding has a nice blue, white, and coffee cream (like this, though maybe a touch darker for a more bronzed look) color pattern.

To the left of the door, pressed up against the left wall, is a tall dresser full of casual clothes that Sycamore doesn’t wear too often, but still likes on days when he can just relax around and be … well, casual. (So like, novelty shirts, comfy pants, that sort of thing.) On top of the dresser is a small TV that, again, isn’t used very often, but that he still watches sometimes if he’s having difficulty falling asleep and there’s a neat documentary showing on the late night Discovery channel. To the right of the door is a dark wood (like, deep mahogany) vanity table, though to be honest this is very rarely used; mostly it’s covered in clothes that haven’t been moved for months, books that got randomly set aside, things of that nature. Sycamore usually gets ready for the day in the bathroom, so really the vanity table is just there to be a set piece. It’s nice. It has a mirror. But it doesn’t have a chair and in all seriousness, Sycamore very often forgets it’s a part of his bedroom at all.

Since he has his actual research room in the lab part of the house, and since he considers his bedroom a place of relaxation and sleep rather than work, he doesn’t have a desk in his room. He doesn’t have a proper bookshelf, either, but there are still books all over his room. Some are on the unused vanity table, as mentioned. Others are on the shelves of his bed’s headboard, or on the night tables next to the lamps (both of which match, are stylized wood, and have nice cream colored lampshades). There are some in the drawers on either side of the bed, as well. It has been suggested numerous times that he just swap the vanity table out for a bookshelf, and he always says, “Yes, I probably will!” but then he just forgets. I mean, he forgets the vanity table is even there, so of course he’s going to forget to swap it out. (Where did the vanity table even come from, you may wonder, and he doesn’t have an answer for you. He doesn’t remember. It is a Mystery™.)

Lastly, he has an alarm clock on the night table to the left of his bed (digital), and a framed picture on one of the shelves of his bed’s headboard of himself, Gabrielle, Alan, and Lizardon. This picture, unlike most of the other pictures around the house / lab / in photo albums, was not candid. Instead, it was a posed picture taken the day Alan left on his journey when he was twelve, a sort of, “let’s take a picture before you leave, to have something to remember this day by” type of deal. Alan had smiled, a bit awkward and embarrassed but not uncomfortable, and said, “It’s not like I’m going to be gone for very long. And we’re going to talk over video phone pretty regularly.”

Sycamore had shrugged, still smiling, and said, “Maybe so, but I think it’s nice to have a picture to commemorate the day nonetheless.”

There’s not much argument to be put up against that logic (and again, Alan wasn’t uncomfortable, just a bit off-guard and embarrassed), so Alan agreed and they took the picture. In it, Sycamore has one arm around Alan’s shoulders. Alan’s holding Lizardon in his arms, and Gabrielle is standing just behind them, one claw on Sycamore’s shoulder, the other on Alan’s. It’s actually a very nice family photo, all things considered. It was especially nice to look at after Alan dropped out of contact a year later, and then was completely M.I.A. for two years after that.

As far as the master bathroom goes, that has one door (which again, opens inward), and the flooring is white ceramic tile. To the left is a double sink, with a huge mirror over both. There’s a walk-in closet in the bathroom (straight across from the sinks), and a huge circular tub straight ahead from the door. There’s also a glass shower right next to the bathtub (and the toilet on the other side), which is useful for when Sycamore doesn’t have the time for a long and involved bath.

12.) Favorite book genre?

Aside from non-fiction books about various pokémon (which he of course enjoys and devours quite regularly—he’s very good about keeping abreast with ongoing research in the scientific pokéworld), he really likes fantasy, both classical and modern (though he has a preference for classical, high fantasy over modern fantasy, in all honesty). He likes some sci-fi as well, but he can be a bit pickier about that; he prefers sci-fi that is a blend between sci-fi and fantasy, as that makes it a bit easier for him to suspend his disbelief when it comes to how much (or how little) research has been put into the work. (Like, if it’s very clearly “we’re just here to have a good time” he’s cool with it, but if it’s taking itself seriously, then he doesn’t want to see blatant scientific inaccuracies all over it. That’s annoying.) He honestly doesn’t read for pleasure very much since there’s always some new scholarly journal out that he wants to get through, but he does read for pleasure when he can and tends to go for fantasy when he does.

31.) Most prized possession?

He has two!

So, this is headcanon that deviates off a canonical (albeit gameverse) design that we have, and is also a bit #spoilers for an upcoming fic I’m writing, but regardless, one of his most prized possessions is his watch. His watch has a very nice leather band, but most importantly is the face; the numbers are in Roman numerals, which is fine enough, but what makes the watch special is that the watch face is engraved with the image of a Xerneas tree, and has a very subtle rainbow effect depending on how the light hits it. This watch was a birthday present for his twenty-sixth birthday, given to him by his unofficially adopted son (whom he had been taking care of for just about a year, at that point—his birthday is only about five days off from the day he found Alan). If you’re wondering how a six-year-old could possibly afford something like that, well, he couldn’t; although Alan didn’t know it at the time, his twelve meticulously saved up dollars (saved from change that the lab’s zigzagoon had brought him with the Pickup ability, along with change he found in the sofa, change Sycamore gave him for sweets, et cetera) did not cover the cost of this very nice watch. Instead, he paid twelve dollars, and—unbeknownst to him—Fulbert ponied up the rest of the cash needed. (Years later it dawns on him that this watch was probably more expensive than twelve dollars, but as a child he does not connect these dots.) Either way, Alan alone was the one who picked it out, and the one who presented it to Sycamore. Not only is the watch beautiful, but it was a rather thoughtful gift from this boy that Sycamore was already pretty goddamn attached to, so it’s definitely one of his most prized possessions, and one he takes very good care of throughout the years.

His other most prized possession is the leather wristband that holds his Key Stone, on his other wrist. This wristband looks plain from a distance, but up close you can see that it has some very intricate designs worked into the leather that were inspired by the natural scales of a garchomp. This was given to him as a gift from Meyer, after he started working with Sycamore so they could do more indepth study into the effects mega evolution has on the human and pokémon partners. (Meyer played it off, like, “well, it’s not very good to just keep your Key Stone in your pocket,” and that’s true, but it still set off little bells in Sycamore’s head, like, he’s interested, this is clear and marked interest!!) So that’s his other most prized possession. :)

Aaand the rest goes under a cut, since this is long enough already, haha.

36.) What makes them feel guilty?

Simple, base guilt can come in the form of not doing something that he knows he’s supposed to be doing. In university, a lot of this was tangled up in all of his missed classes, neglected school assignments, et cetera. Sycamore’s attention has always been pretty devoted to the specific things he’s interested in, while neglecting things he isn’t; as such, when that was combined with his depression and anxiety, the classes he didn’t hold much interest in were often neglected, which made him feel guilty because he knew he shouldn’t be neglecting them. (He had a responsibility, the classes were expensive, et cetera.) In his adult life he doesn’t encounter this too often since he has managed to make his life about the things he’s most interested in, but it can still catch up to him if he, say, puts off doing the dishes or sweeping the floors longer than he (feels he) should.

Deeper guilt, however, comes from feeling like those he loves or cares about are hurt because of him. A not completely devastating form of this, for example, comes from an incident when he accidentally makes Alan cry when Alan is five; again, this is somewhat #spoilers for a fic I’m writing, but essentially Alan has been living with him for about a month, and there’s a situation where Alan accidentally puts himself in potential danger (like, nothing super dangerous happened, but it could have and that’s the point), and Sycamore gets very worried and like … not yells at him, per se, but his voice is raised more than normal, he’s scolding to a degree (“don’t ever do that again” et cetera), and he’s far more worried than he is angry but Alan, as a five-year-old who comes from a background where everyone was angry and he was always bad all the time doesn’t take it very well at all, and ends up crying because he thinks that now Sycamore probably hates him, too, and he’ll have to leave, and he likes living here and now he messed everything up. Sycamore, of course, is rather horrified at himself for making Alan cry (good god, he never meant to do that), and he ends up comforting him and smoothing things over and learning from this experience, but yeah, that made him feel pretty bad. The fact that he tried to hug Alan when he first noticed this, and Alan recoiled and pulled away, made him feel even worse. He never wanted to hurt him, of course, he was just worried, but that is definitely a learning experience of “okay, remember to approach calmly, because even if you’re frazzled, he’s a child who comes from a very bad environment, yelling—or anything close to yelling—is really not the best approach to take here.” So that wasn’t catastrophic guilt, but Sycamore did still feel pretty bad about that for a while, because even though he did have very good reason to be worried, again, he made the five-year-old child cry. That’s never what he wanted.

But as I said, he can also feel guilty for feeling like he hasn’t done enough, or like he didn’t take measures he should have taken to protect those close to him. Truthfully, even the above scenario can count to a degree given that … well, it’s #spoilers, but essentially Sycamore recognizes that it wouldn’t have happened had he kept a better eye on Alan (or at least he feels that way—it really wasn’t his fault, but then, Alan is five in that instance and Sycamore is his primary caretaker, so he feels responsible). In terms of canon, though, he does feel pretty guilty for all the time he spent telling himself “I’m sure Alan is fine, he’s just busy, he’s fine, everything’s okay” when everything was clearly not okay. He had no way of knowing the truth, and logically he knows that, but his heart tells him that, okay, he should have realized something was really, really wrong when Alan just suddenly dropped out of contact. He should have tried looking for him. He shouldn’t have protected his own feelings with denial when his teenage son just suddenly stopped calling and checking in. Alan could have died and Sycamore hadn’t even tried to find him until Hoenn’s Champion called him on the phone, ffs, and so on and so forth. Luckily, Alan didn’t die and Sycamore is doing what he can to help him now (and as you mentioned, Alan’s sleeping comfortably in the next room over each night), so it gets easier, but that guilt is still there, the plaguing thoughts of bad things that could have happened nagging at him at night. (And if you think that guilt is bad, then the upcoming chapters of To Devour the Sun are surely going to make you feel a certain kind of way, let me tell you.)

It’s not just Alan, either. He feels guilt for some time after Team Rocket takes Gabrielle—both because of the rampage and her kidnapping later—because both times he feels as if he should have been more present, should have been able to prevent that from happening to her in the first place. Things like that get to him, too. (And you’ll notice a lot of this comes from a feeling like he should be taking care of or protecting others. It’s a bit of a “like father, like son” situation there, isn’t it? ;) )

Alan—

8.) Favorite indulgence and feelings surrounding indulging

Sweets. Sweets and coffee.

Alan has a massive sweet tooth, and this is undeniable. Even if he tried to deny it (which he wouldn’t, because he’s not one to lie), it would be impossible to when he carries mini dark chocolate bars in his travel bag just in case he happens to get a craving (which he does just about every day). Dark chocolate is his favorite type of sweet, but he likes milk chocolate too, and will even go for fruity hard candies or lollipops if he doesn’t have chocolate on hand (for whatever reason) but still wants something sugary. He eats candy on the daily (again, he carries those little dark chocolate bars around with him, and those are easy enough to just pop in his mouth to let melt when he wants something sweet), ice cream is his favorite comfort food, and even his breakfasts are usually sweet, since his preferred choice of breakfast pastry always has chocolate in it (chocolate croissants, for instance). And as for coffee? Well, he loves coffee, and has ever since Sycamore first started allowing him to drink it when he turned ten. While he usually puts an astonishing amount of sugar in his coffee (you know, to sweeten it up), that doesn’t change the fact that he does like the coffee taste beneath the sugar, that he likes coffee flavored ice creams and cakes, or that he loves the smell of coffee in general. He has to have at least one cup of coffee daily, and usually drinks several throughout the day, given how erratic his sleeping habits are. That caffeine is rather necessary.

As for how he feels about it, in all honesty he doesn’t think about it too much. He certainly doesn’t feel guilty over it. He’s very active, brushes his teeth at least twice per day, and has a metabolism as fast as any ninjask. As such, the calories and sugars that sweets (and coffee) are loaded with don’t concern him at all. And while caffeine is often called a “drug” and is technically “unhealthy,” as far as Alan is concerned, there are worse things. It’s not like he’s taking narcotics, or binge drinking alcohol, and besides: either he gets his caffeine, or he’s tired and irritable all day. He thinks he’s making the right decision here. (“Or you could just get more sleep like a normal person,” someone might say, but he just pretends to not hear them.)

So he definitely indulges in sweets, and he doesn’t feel guilty about it in the slightest. He has plenty of other things that he makes himself feel guilty about, anyway; he really doesn’t need to add allowing himself to eat chocolate on the daily to the list.

22.) Given a blank piece of paper, a pencil, and nothing to do, what would happen?

Doodles are likely to happen. While Alan is not a master artist by any means, he does like doodle every now and again, whether it’s in the margins of research notes or just on a scrap piece of paper. In this situation, where he has a full piece of paper, a pencil, and nothing to do, he might doodle out little illustrations of pokémon, or random shapes and designs, or things around him that turn into abstract shapes and designs as he lets his mind wander. Most of the music he listens to is instrumental and therefore doesn’t have lyrics, but some of the songs he listens to do, and so he might write out song lyrics if he has them stuck in his head (and the same thing goes for poetry verses, if he’s heard a poem recently). Sometimes he’ll write out names, stylized and made to look cool (such as Lizardon’s, for instance). Or maybe, depending on where he is in his life and journey, he might write a letter. Perhaps he has written many letters over the years, all of them unsent.

Things like that.

33.) Concept of home and family?

Home is the lab. Home is the lab because that was the first home, the first real home he ever knew after five years of never having a home for real and forever, but instead being shuffled from household to household because no one ever wanted him. Home is the lab, and the particular scent it has all throughout that makes his chest feel a bit constricted, but the air in his lungs feel free. Home is the garden, thick with the scent of trees, grass, and the pond, full of the sounds of the various pokémon playing and squabbling and being themselves. Home is the garden full of zigzagoon that weave around his feet (and Jigsaw the linoone, who always jumps up to meet him), the combee that buzz around his head and brush against his ear, the psyduck that always tries to impress him by making pebbles wobble or flop into the pond with weak Confusion attacks (that he always pretends to be impressed by anyway, so that the psyduck’s confidence and self-esteem is boosted). Home is the kitchen that always, always smells of coffee, but also usually has the lingering scent of whatever the last meal to be cooked there was for good measure. Home is the research room that has the strong scent of books, but also the electronic smell of the computer equipment, warm and metallic, but familiar and welcoming. Home is the well-worn, but so soft sofa in the living room; his bedroom, with his comfortable bed and bookshelf and desk and star projections on the ceiling; the Professor’s bedroom, where he’d sit on the Professor’s bed as the Professor fixed his hair in the bathroom, and the two of them would talk as the Professor finished getting ready. Home is lounging out in the garden, reading a book to Lizardon as the other pokémon play around him. Home is sitting on the roof with Lizardon, watching the sun set or rise, preparing for an early morning or evening flight. Home is where work blends with relaxation, where he can lounge on the couch as he goes over the day’s research or pokémon’s medical charts, where he can grab a snack from the kitchen before heading into the research room to put a book in front of him and his plate beside him and sit cross-legged on the floor, where he can play music from a CD player in the med room while examining the pokémon that have to stay there to recuperate. Home is where everything comes together, where he’s just as much at ease working as he is relaxing, where all the information and knowledge he could ever want is right there at his fingertips, but isn’t impatient for him to take it. Home is safety, home is comfort, home is happiness and light and love. Home is all of those things, and so is the lab, because the lab is all of those things and always will be to Alan.

As far as family is concerned, Alan never knew his biological parents. He doesn’t know what happened to them, if they died and that’s why he was abandoned, if they just didn’t want him and that’s why they left him instead. If they are still alive, he doesn’t know if he has any biological siblings. He doesn’t know who his biological grandparents are, if he had aunts, uncles, or cousins. His entire biological background is lost to him, a mystery he doesn’t know and has no way of solving on his own.

He also knows that it doesn’t matter.

It doesn’t matter because as far as he’s concerned—as far as he has been concerned since Sycamore first took him in when he was five—Sycamore is his father. This is, admittedly, a bit of a touchy subject; the adoption was never official, after all, and Alan took it the wrong way (as in, though Sycamore has just honestly never thought of making it official because he doesn’t see a need, Alan still thinks he’s in the process of earning that official adoption). But while it’s a bit of a touchy subject in that sense—while Alan knows that, officially (and perhaps logically) he’s not Sycamore’s son, Sycamore is not his father, he can’t claim that out loud—internally, as far as how he feels, as far as how he thinks of Sycamore in relation to him, it’s not an issue. He knows that, officially and logically, Sycamore is not his father. Nevertheless, in his heart, he feels that Sycamore is. When he closes his eyes and thinks of his father, Sycamore is the one who comes to mind. He certainly loves him as he would his father—loves him as the only father he could ever want or need, as the best father he could have had. And if Sycamore doesn’t feel the same way, if Sycamore just thinks of Alan as his assistant and nothing more—well, Alan won’t lie to himself and say that it doesn’t hurt or that he isn’t saddened by that, because of course he is (though he would never say so out loud out of fear of being an ungrateful emotional burden). But it doesn’t change how he feels or thinks. It doesn’t change the fact that he still considers Sycamore to be his father, that he sees Sycamore as his family, that he’ll always feel that way and always love Sycamore as such even if Sycamore never comes to see him as a son. It’s okay if Sycamore doesn’t feel that way. It doesn’t change how Alan feels about him.

(Of course, Sycamore does see Alan as his son—but without that talk ever happening, Alan is left with doubts and insecurities, not helped by the fact that he’s positive everything he did under Lysandre no doubt set him backward about ten thousand feet. If he hadn’t earned the right to call the Professor “Dad” before, surely it’s out of the realm of possibility now. He knows this falsehood to be true, but you had better believe he’s not going to breathe a word of it. It’s not the Professor’s fault he’s so terrible. The Professor is under no obligation to want to adopt him, and Alan is not about to bring it up or guilt him into it. No way.)

Alan’s family grows over time, too. Sycamore of course introduces Alan to his parents after unofficially adopting him, and if Sycamore is his unofficially adopted father (and he is), then Sycamore’s parents are his unofficially adopted grandparents (who love him to pieces). Although Gabrielle is undoubtedly Sycamore’s garchomp, Alan is the one who brought her home as a gible, and is the only one allowed to call her Gabby. She is family, too, and though she doesn’t have a specific familial role (like, Sycamore is Alan’s father, but Gabby is simply Gabby), she doesn’t need one. It doesn’t stop her from being family.

There’s Lizardon, too. Lizardon also doesn’t have a specific familial role—Alan refers to him as his best friend, as his partner—and in truth, they are platonic soulmates, even though neither of them thinks in these terms, generally. But they recognize each other as inseparable, and Lizardon is certainly part of the family. Both Sycamore and Gabrielle recognize him as such, after all, and that means it must be true.

And the family grows even from there. Sycamore dates a few times over the years, but his last (and permanent) relationship is with Meyer, whom he eventually marries. This makes Meyer Alan’s stepdad, and while Alan isn’t as close to him as he is Sycamore (of course), they still have a good relationship, and openly embrace their new familial relationship. With Meyer comes two new younger stepsiblings for Alan in the form of Clemont and Bonnie. Alan and Clemont get along pretty well, both in terms of Alan enjoying seeing Clemont’s new inventions and Clemont enjoying talking research with Alan (and, in later years, Clemont joining Alan’s Elite Four), and Bonnie adores Alan pretty much from the moment she meets him. When they’re younger he gives her rides on Lizardon fairly often (or at least when she asks and he has time), and when they’re older she’s his usual point of contact at the Ranger Union.

And while she’s not an adopted member of the family, Manon is as good as his little sister, too. Though he doesn’t explicitly think of her as his sister, he still loves her like family—loves her in the exact same way he loves Clemont and Bonnie—and treats her as such. (Manon, meanwhile, probably does explicitly think of him as the big brother she never had, even if she’d never outright say it.) They remain close throughout the years and Manon is always invited on family vacations and to family dinners. It’s never a hassle when she stops by. (And she very often does, especially after she—like Clemont—joins Alan’s Elite Four.)

Alan loves his family dearly. And it probably goes without saying, but woe betide anyone who tries to hurt any one of them. Alan is protective over people in general—part of what makes him such a fantastic Champion is that he will lay his life on the line to protect the people of the world without a second thought—but given that he is a boy who, for the first five years of his life, never had a family and desperately longed for one, you had better believe that he cherishes the family he has now. Should someone hurt, or even try to hurt them, well, they can pick a god (or several) to pray to all they like, but in all honesty, it isn’t going to do them very much good by the time Alan is through with them.

45.) Superstitions or views on the occult?

Alan is not superstitious in the least bit. While he’s aware of a great many superstitions, both good and bad, he views them all as things that people either made up for laughs and then were taken too far by others, things that actually had perfectly reasonable explanations that people just didn’t realize at the time, or things that were made up for laughs and then spun out of the realm of reason by paranoid people who saw the superstition in everything. For instance, perhaps a paranoid person broke a mirror once, and then—knowing the superstition about broken mirrors and seven years of bad luck—went on to then attribute everything bad that happened over the next seven years as being caused by the broken mirror. It wasn’t caused by the broken mirror. Mirrors are just reflective glass in frames, they can’t curse someone with bad luck. But for a superstitious, paranoid person who already believes something like that, they’ll start seeing the bad luck curse in everything that goes wrong, no matter what the actual source is. It doesn’t mean the superstition is true; it just means that a gullible person believes that it is.

So Alan is not superstitious, believing things like that to just be human invention. Even when it comes to good superstitions, such as the ones surrounding the four-leaf clover, Alan doesn’t believe in them, especially since—as he points out when Manon shows him the four-leaf clover she found—saying that four-leaf clovers are lucky doesn’t even really make sense since only one of the leaves represents luck. The other three represent hope, faith, and love. (Manon just sighs in exaggerated annoyance, puffs her cheeks, and says that she’s going to keep her lucky clover anyway. Alan shrugs and says she can do what she likes, but the clover itself isn’t lucky. This doesn’t help to ease Manon’s annoyance.)

As for the occult, well, this is less a matter of “not believing,” and more a matter of “not being afraid.” Ghost-type pokémon obviously exist, but Alan is not afraid of them because, even if they are ghost-types, they’re still pokémon, and he isn’t afraid of pokémon. Actual ghosts (as in, the actual souls of departed beings that haunt places) might exist, but even if they do, Alan doesn’t see a real reason to be afraid of them, either. Sure, they’re ghost-ghosts (heh, ghost-ghosts), but what makes them more harmful than ghost-type pokémon? Even if the battle isn’t traditional, he still has Lizardon. He knows how to handle ghost-type pokémon. So he isn’t afraid of ghost-ghosts (heh) either.

As for other occult-style things … he doesn’t believe in demons, really, as there’s nothing in his culture that would lead him to believe they exist, and he’s not really affected by them even if they do. There are trainers who fancy themselves hex maniacs, and maybe their magic is real, but also maybe it isn’t. There are people who have actual, legitimate psychic ability, and some even have positions of importance around the world as Gym Leaders or Elite Four members. Look at Olympia—her power is certainly real, and undeniable. There’s also mega evolution to consider. It’s mystical in its own way, even though the power is born from the souls of the pokémon and person that they’ve bonded with, and activated via the Key Stones and Mega Stones. Even though they’re studying it with science, it’s still magic in its own way. It’s still a powerful, mystical force.

So these things—magic, psychic phenomena, and all that—exist. Alan knows that they exist. But that’s just it—they exist as a factual part of his world as he knows it. But just because these things exist doesn’t mean that he has to (or that he should be) afraid of them. Even if they’re dangerous, there are a lot of dangerous things. Eating can be dangerous if you choke. Cars can be dangerous if you lose control of the vehicle. Planes crash. Hurricanes happen. There are so many things that can cause grievous bodily harm or even death in the world, but it’s impractical to be afraid of all of them. (Or even if you’re afraid, you can’t let that fear dominate and stop you—you have to push forward, push through it.) Even when it comes to things that perhaps can’t be understood, such as how certain people have psychic powers, even then Alan doesn’t see a reason to be afraid. Even if he doesn’t understand now, that doesn’t mean it’s impossible for him to understand in the future. He can learn, and with that knowledge his ignorance will diminish and then evaporate. There’s no reason to remain in fearful ignorance, not when he has the tools at his disposal to learn.

So Alan isn’t at all afraid of occult things. Even if some mystical, non-pokémon creature tried to attack him, he could and would fight back with Lizardon. Occult things don’t scare him at all; he just accepts them as another fact of the world, like rain or earthquakes.

All of that said, at some point a horror movie about changelings is released, and Manon is with him when he sees an advertisement for it, and makes a face before moving on. She misinterprets this and thinks that the reason why he made that face is because it scared him, especially when he says he’s not going to go see the movie with her. She’s delighted to have finally found something that scares him, and Alan lets her think that without correcting her. In this case, it’s far easier to let her think he’s scared than to tell her the truth.

Link, Hero of the Wild—

6.) Eating habits and sample daily menu

When he first awoke from his one hundred year resurrection coma, Link was told by the Old Man that he was going to have to forage and hunt for food. He was also told, in a completely not subtle “hint,” that the Old Man wanted Link to make him a spicy meat and seafood fry.

“I’m supposed to hunt these boars?” Link said. “These boars that have done nothing to me? These boars that run away from me? These boars that just want to eat grass and live? I can’t do that. It’s one thing to kill the bokoblins that also want to kill me, but it’s another to hunt down and kill a boar. I can’t do that. I won’t do that. And you can make your own spicy meat and seafood fry, you weird old man who I’m honestly not sure isn’t evil yet.”

The Old Man stared at Link for a long moment, as if trying to decide what to say. Finally, he said, “Do what you feel is best,” and that was that.

Link’s resolve lasted for a little while. Link’s resolve lasted through to the night, even as his stomach growled from only having two baked apples in it. Link’s resolve lasted as he was jumped by multiple bokoblins, all of whom Link thought were rather jerks for ganging up on a guy who had nothing but a ratty shirt, too-small pants, and a stick to defend himself with. And his resolve lasted until the following afternoon, when he was bleeding from several places, armed with a wooden boko bow and several arrows, his stomach aching from hunger, and saw a boar ambling across the grass in front of him—

Link was wounded, exhausted, and starving. Apple trees were scarce, apparently—he hadn’t seen another one, didn’t know where another one was, was too tired to keep scavenging around for one—and the boar was right there. The boar wanted to live, but so did Link. And unlike Link, the boar didn’t apparently have an entire freakin’ kingdom (world? Link was unclear on that part) to save.

Link apologized to the boar. He said, “I’m sorry, boar. I’m so, so sorry.” And then he shot it.

From then on, Link’s policy became as such: He would hunt only what he needed to survive. Some animals were off-limits: Canines (both domestic and wild), horses, and endangered species like bears and rhinos. Everything else, though? Fair game. Taste doesn’t matter very much to Link. While he of course has preferences (he really likes meat and rice bowls, likes mushroom risotto, likes apple pies and cake when he wants sweet things), he also has a strict “beggars can’t be choosers” policy and will eat honestly anything when he’s bruised and bleeding out. It doesn’t even matter if it’s dubious food; if it has a chance of healing him, and he’s in a bloody heap of broken bones on the side of a wall while a Guardian Stalker is charging its laser on the other side, you had better believe he’s going to shove whatever-the-fuck down his throat in an attempt to clear his blurry vision and help himself stand up straight. Dubious food? If he must. Boar? Bird? That weird mushroom he found on the underside of a rock? He honest to Din does not care, just get it down his throat so he doesn’t die. Even if he’s not bleeding out, if he’s hungry … if he hasn’t eaten in over a day … beggars can’t be choosers, he has a world to save, he can’t die yet, and at least not like this. Down the hatch it goes. This is a post-apocalyptic world anyway, it’s not like there’s a grocery store on every street, beggars can’t be choosers, he’ll take whatever he can get his hands on and eat whatever he has to in order to survive.

(That said, he does still feel bad about the animals he kills, even if he always makes sure to only kill what he needs to survive. In return, he has a policy that if the animals of the world want to kill and eat him, too, then that’s fair. He just asks that they wait and let him save Hyrule first.)

17.) Preferred mode of dress and rituals surrounding dress

Practical and comfy!

As far as colors go, Link’s favorite color is green, though he developed quite a fondness for blue thanks to Zelda’s fondness for it rubbing off on him over the years, and as such he honestly wears more blue than green at this point. It’s a subconscious thing. (Brings out his eyes, anyway, or so Zelda said once, and Link’s not entirely sure what that means—because that’s a weird turn of phrase, isn’t it?—but it sounded like a compliment, so he took it and has held onto it ever since.) But color really isn’t as important as other things to Link, such as practical use and comfort.

Link is an active guy. He moves around a lot. Walking and running aside, he rides horses, he climbs all over the damn mountains, and he gets in a fuck ton of fights. Like, a lot of fights. He could probably do with less fights in his life, honestly, but tell that to the monsters that keep attacking him. (And okay, sometimes he picks the fights because the ‘blins have treasure in their camps, but it’s not like they’d just let him take the treasure. And sure, yeah, sometimes he picks fights with lynels, but honestly? The lynels would just as soon as pick fights with him. Sometimes they do. He asks to take a selfie and they just attack. What is he supposed to do in that situation, hm? That’s what he thought.) For this reason, it is a necessity that whatever he wears be easy to move in, without risk of his limbs getting tangled up in it. So like, nothing too flowy, because that causes a problem, but also nothing restricting and skintight (or at least nothing tighter than the Sheikah pants). There has to be a balance there, for comfort as much as flexibility and ease of movement. He also needs his clothes to have good defense; again, he gets in a lot of fights, so it’s important to him that his clothes aren’t going to be just as useless as being naked would be. This is, in all honesty, the main issue he has with his Gerudo vai outfit. He really doesn’t care that this outfit is technically for women (though he also doesn’t understand why certain clothes are “for women” and certain clothes are “for men” because they’re just clothes, why can’t people just wear what they want?). What he cares about is the fact that they’re useless, defensively. It doesn’t even make sense to him; the Gerudo are warriors, or at least a good deal of them are. So why are their clothes so flimsy and defenseless?! What use do these things have?! And why is it that his Gerudo voe pants have such better defense than his Gerudo vai pants, when they look exactly the same?! (And for that matter, seriously, there is no difference, they look the same, they are both pants, they’re PANTS, why are they gendered, why is this even a discussion.) It doesn’t make any sense, and compounding his frustration is the fact that the Great Fairies won’t enhance his vai gear. Frickin’—it makes no sense. Nayru’s knickers, it makes no sense. He’s mad about it. He’s so mad. He’s going to have talks about this with Riju, see if he doesn’t.

(He remembers this when they have to make a diplomatic mission to Gerudo Town after the events of the game and brings it up. Zelda tells him that this is not the time, and he balks at her, because if this isn’t the time, what is? This is an important issue, Zelda. People could die because these clothes are so useless. And he, for one, doesn’t want to die because his clothes were useless when a molduga decided to attack the town, thanks. Zelda just sighs and resolves to never bring him on a diplomatic mission again if this is how he’s going to act. He’s not made any less indignant by this remark.)

So yes, Link’s clothes policy is basically, “blue or green if it can be swung, but mostly they need to have ease of mobility, and good defense.” That’s basically what it boils down to. Oh, and he always ties his hair back, so it’s not in his face while fighting. He’s very fond of the Gerudo topknot/headband, but will make do with just a ponytail if need-be. So long as his hair is out of his face, he’s happy.

24.) Is there one subject of study that they excel at? Or do they even care about intellectual pursuits at all?

Horse care and combat. ;)

Link is really not academically oriented; he gets restless if he has to sit still for too long, and this goes doubly so if he’s supposed to sit still and just listen for great lengths of time. Reading is difficult, too; his mind tends to wander and his limbs feel twitchy, and he wants to get up and do things. (Zelda points out that he seems to have no problem reading people’s diaries, at which point Link sheepishly says that, well, he never said he wasn’t nosy. Besides, sometimes people tell him he can’t read them, and then it’s like he has to, especially if that person is annoying like Purah. Come on, she was asking for it.) Link is far from stupid, but scholarly pursuits were never really his thing, at least in the form of traditional learning. He was never very adept at lessons, not at all.

But that said, Link is a hands-on learner—he learns by doing. So he learned about horse care by learning how to take care of his horses, by paying attention to things they liked and didn’t, by paying attention when they were fed and brushed so that he would know what to do. He paid attention in his combat lessons growing up because they were physical, and didn’t demand that he sit there and listen to theory. He has learned by doing as well, given that he had bows shoved into his hands and monsters trying to kill him and either had to do or die. That will teach someone—or at least it taught Link—very quickly.

So he’s very good with horses (and other animals), and he’s good at combat. He can cook, too, through trial and error of cooking food over the course of his journey. He’s not so great at remembering recipes he reads, but he’s good at remembering them after making them enough times. He’s not going to study a cookbook any time soon, but he’ll throw things in a pot and see what comes of it.

All of this said, while he’s not scholarly himself, he does enjoy listening to Zelda talk about her interests. He likes the way her eyes light up and her cheeks flush a bit when she’s happy. He loves her smile and hearing her voice crack in delight when she discovers something. So he sees those uses in academics; it’s just that the actual scholarly part of it really isn’t for him.

49.) If this person were to get into a fist fight, what is their fighting style like?

So like, an actual fistfight? No weapons?

Tackle, and then hit the person until they stop (i.e. until they give up or are knocked out).

Honestly, this is kind of Link’s strategy even when he has weapons. He might snipe from a distance if possible, but when he has a melee weapon in hand he just hits and hits and hits until either he’s dead or the monster is. He’ll use his shield sometimes—that’s especially useful for Guardian lasers with enough practice—and he can use flurry attacks and the like, but Link is very much an “attack, attack, attack” sort of guy. He doesn’t give up. He doesn’t quit. And if he attacks the thing enough times, probably he’s going to win. So he’d adapt that strategy to a fistfight, too: tackle the fucker and keep hitting them until they stop. Maybe it lacks finesse, but it gets the job done. Or at the very least, he very hazily recalls a time when some guy in Castle Town made a snide remark about Zelda being a “failed princess” under his breath, and Zelda pretended not to notice, but Link himself heard, and, well, his “tackle and hit until they stop” strategy seemed to work then.

(He’s not sure if this memory is real or not, but when he asks Zelda about it her eyes go wide and her cheeks are pink and she puts her face in her hands and says, “Of all the things for you to remember …” so he figures it probably is. If that strategy worked then, it’ll work now. He’s pretty sure the world hasn’t changed so much for this not to hold true anymore.)

#ryttu3k #excessively detailed headcanon tumblr meme #HAHA I FINALLY FINISHED IT #TAKE THAT GOOGLE CHROME #YOU CAN'T STOP ME #MY WRISTS AND HANDS ARE ACHING BUT //YOU CAN'T STOP ME//#my valiant dragon son #professor sycamore #link #hero of the wild

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